The Steel Guitar Forum

Posted: **24 Feb 2020 8:55 am**

I always set up on the left end,and as far back as I can.Helps keep people out of my space.My main steel( a mica Mullen RP U-12) is 95% as tough as Mike Perlowin's MSA's,so I haven't had any problems so far.All that said,I decided awhile back that the high-end and vintage pieces were going to stay home unless it was a very special gig.My ideal setup is on the kind of stage pictured below.

Posted: **24 Feb 2020 2:05 pm**

I used to play at a really terrible place in Anchorage Alaska,The owner actually bit part of the bartender's ear off,I used to keep a stun gun in my jacket pocket,always ready for stupid people.

Posted: **24 Feb 2020 4:19 pm**

I guess I don't understand why we would only play our best instruments in a place where nobody but us could hear them...yeah, they will lose some value from dings...but I enjoy playing my good stuff and enjoy it even more when there is an audience...even if they don't really appreciate the difference. I play better when I'm not playing a beater...beaters just cheapen the whole approach to playing...
And yeah, I've had dancers crash into my pedal steel (I was able to push back in time), and band members knock over my dobro (broken tuner), and other band folks actually try to sit on my steel while waiting to bring it onstage (no damage, and I got to work off some excess energy while explaining to them why that wasn't a good thing).
Just a cost of doing business...you've lost more on trading equipment over the years than you will ever lose to damage...

Posted: **25 Feb 2020 7:21 am**

When I first got my StageOne, I was at a rehearsal, hadn't even gigged with it yet. We were auditioning a new guitarist, who managed to bump his mic stand which tipped over into my steel. No gig yet and the first chip in the finish. Was a bummer. For a minute.

I've never been one to wring my hands over pristine gear, but then again, I don't have anything all that pricey.

Posted: **25 Feb 2020 7:46 am**

I guess I don't understand why we would only play our best instruments in a place where nobody but us could hear them.

I take my very best guitars out to lots of gigs. But what the OP describes is different - lots of really drunk people doing really stupid stuff. I think I know exactly what he's talking about. Guitars can get seriously harmed or even destroyed in this type of situation. I haven't had any guitars destroyed myself, but I've witnessed it first hand. Sometimes it's even intentional - I've seen that too.

I have some pretty nice guitars, including a few that are pretty much impossible to replace. I do everythiing I can to keep them in good shape. Sometimes that means not placing them in harm's way. If I was again doing the kind of pedal steel gigs Steve is talking about, I'd get another inexpensive but good-quality pedal steel to take.

Just a cost of doing business...you've lost more on trading equipment over the years than you will ever lose to damage.

Not me. It is not necessary to accept these kind of losses without a fight.

Posted: **25 Feb 2020 10:44 am**

I completely respect everyone's thoughts about their own equipment - I was just speaking for myself. My attitude towards stuff I own has mellowed over the years, but I surely was completely concerned about it all at one point...

But I actually worry more about gear being stolen - here in PDX you can't even lock your gear in a closed car trunk after your set, to go hear the band following you...people watch for that and rip you off. And forget being on tour with a van and a trailer at a hotel - trailer will be gone in the morning...I've been lucky so far - I never leave stuff in the car any more, even hidden....

Posted: **25 Feb 2020 12:07 pm**

Steve Lipsey wrote:here in PDX you can't even lock your gear in a closed car trunk after your set, to go hear the band following you...people watch for that and rip you off. And forget being on tour with a van and a trailer at a hotel - trailer will be gone in the morning...

A little more of this v might mean a lot less of that ^

Jack Goodson wrote:i have played in just about every venue you can imagine, some that asked if u had a gun and if u said no they would give u one....jack

Posted: **26 Feb 2020 5:54 pm**

I think Dave M gets it.

And Steve L., I appreciate your perspective as well.

All my gear, I bought to play. In public. Not to treat as a museum piece that canâ€™t be taken on a gig.

The jobs Iâ€™m referring to have no bandstand ( at least not one large enough for me.)
Iâ€™m set up on the floor, the bar fills up, and Iâ€™m surrounded. Iâ€™m getting bumped by the customers. People step on your pedal rack. Asses brush your end plates. Itâ€™s hard to stay focused, and enjoy the gig.

I donâ€™t have any unrealistic expectations about the chances of gear getting damaged on the bandstand. I was on the bandstand when my Mullen was destroyed.

Steve L., your so right about the theft factor. Just another cost of doing business ? Youâ€™ve identified a potential risk, and look to minimize the risk.. Thatâ€™s all Iâ€™m trying to do.

As far as money lost on buying/selling/horse trading gear ? Your right, Iâ€™ve spent my share, but in no way do I see it as money lost. I look at it as a rental fee. I definitely got something for the money. I got to own some cool gear, and then recycle it. Not a loss to me, but my wife would call it a loss....

Another unpleasant aspect to these gigs (Bourbon St., New Orleans) is the potential to get robbed or worse while transporting your gear. At times, the streets are barricaded, and your humping gear quite a distance, through a mob. The predators are out there, and they know you likely just got paid some cash.

I must really like to play music.

Posted: **3 Mar 2020 10:27 am**

With changing technology and changing norms, this might not be totally far-fetched.

You know how people who are into on-line games can compete with others. Say it's a NASCAR race game, you are at your console and are racing 15 other people who may be anywhere else on the globe, all seeing the same graphics and interacting with each other's cars.

So how about a venue in a given place has a big sound system, and an internet link, and maybe a sound guy to tweak it on site. The band could be comprised of 4, or 5, or whatever number you want, anywhere. By arrangement they sit at their instruments at the designated time, obviously able to hear the leader, and when it's time they just handle it as if they were all together. The result coming out at the venue is - in theory - what you would get if they were all there.

This is half tongue-in-cheek, half serious. And with my luck, somebody will chime in and say they've been doing that for years, what rock have I been under?

But at least your best gear would be available with zero chance of some drunk barfing on it, or worse.

Posted: **3 Mar 2020 2:20 pm**

The guy at IBM who invented the PC was certain that people would only ever want them in their offices, and never in their homes. Arthur C. Clarke envisaged WiFi in hotel rooms before there was an internet. So predicting things is unpredictable.

Music is a social activity - not so sure about gaming.

Posted: **4 Mar 2020 4:04 am**

So to answer Dons comments, the chicken wire was a good idea? We would then be placed on the endangered species list and only viewed through a glass enclosure. I'm hoping for more exposure and interaction with the audience. Live music should be done without isolation. I believe MTV is gone.

Posted: **4 Mar 2020 7:39 am**

Steve Spitz wrote: If I decline these gigs, Iâ€™m looking like I donâ€™t want to work. Like a diva, or a prima Donna.
It definitely contributes to not getting called as often.

S,

You have to make a cost analysis . . . the hell with what the band thinks. My last bandleader took anything that paid, including exposed outdoor gigs.

If it looked like a bad scene, or had zero parking (like places in DC) I refused . . . and of course he eventually forced the issue and I quit.

But none of those jobs I missed would have bought me a new steel and amp.

Buddy Cage's saying buoyed me up: "I refuse to play a **** hole for **** money run by a **** head."

M

Posted: **4 Mar 2020 9:27 am**

Don R Brown wrote:So how about a venue in a given place has a big sound system, and an internet link, and maybe a sound guy to tweak it on site. The band could be comprised of 4, or 5, or whatever number you want, anywhere. By arrangement they sit at their instruments at the designated time, obviously able to hear the leader, and when it's time they just handle it as if they were all together. The result coming out at the venue is - in theory - what you would get if they were all there.

Why not go full Monty with this idea and have holographic images of the players projected onto a stage in real time? With the ability to create such a production in multiple venues simultaneously, a band could conceivably do their 30-city tour in one night and never leave home. What could possibly go wrong...

Posted: **4 Mar 2020 2:18 pm**

Fred Treece wrote:
Don R Brown wrote:
Why not go full Monty with this idea and have holographic images of the players projected onto a stage in real time? With the ability to create such a production in multiple venues simultaneously, a band could conceivably do their 30-city tour in one night and never leave home. What could possibly go wrong...
They're doing that now with a hologram of Buddy Holly.

Posted: **4 Mar 2020 2:31 pm**

Roy Orbison too, Mike. Iâ€™m just saying, maybe you could do it with real live players too. Itâ€™s completely ridiculous, of course, but that just makes it more likely to happen.

Posted: **14 Mar 2020 7:14 pm**

What Mark Helper said. One time I played a gig on the outskirts of Phoenix. It was Halloween. During the first set, a woman came out on the dance floor and was attempting to dance by herself. I say attempting because she had a hard time staying upright she was so trashed. Long story short she fell and ended up in my steel. An '81 MSA Uni. And I mean in the steel. Her head went between two of the pedal bars and was locked in there like a cow in the barn. My steel just started wandering away from me as she backed up and she was jumping around with it like a roped steer. I was sitting there on my seat with no steel to play. It took a couple patrons to contain her while I disconnected the pedal rods to let her loose. Remarkably there was no damage to the steel. Tough old MSA! I've been selective where I take my steel since. So much easier to just take a Tele and amp. As much as we hate to admit it, most people don't even know when a steel is not there. These days its easier to just decline these gigs.

Posted: **15 Mar 2020 3:04 pm**

Boy, if there was ever a time for the MSA Millennium, this thread is it. All you'd need is waterproof electronics and tuning gears.

"Gig get a little too rowdy? Take it out and hose it down!"

Posted: **15 Mar 2020 6:53 pm**

Fred Treece wrote:Roy Orbison too, Mike. Iâ€™m just saying, maybe you could do it with real live players too. Itâ€™s completely ridiculous, of course, but that just makes it more likely to happen.

I read once of someone pulling the TCB band back together and having them play live to Elvis holograms!

Posted: **24 Apr 2020 11:24 pm**

I don't play rowdy bars anymore, but If I'm doing a gig where there's no stage, and people milling around, I put a cover over my steel when I'm not playing it. Of course then, it looks like a stool to some people, so I had to put this sign on it. This is the polite version. I had another one that was a little more, uh, direct...

Posted: **25 Apr 2020 7:41 am**

In my experience the kind of people who actually read notices probably wouldn't sit on it anyway. What you do about the others I don't know as we're not allowed guns over here.

Posted: **25 Apr 2020 8:57 am**

Why not go full Monty with this idea and have holographic images of the players projected onto a stage in real time? With the ability to create such a production in multiple venues simultaneously, a band could conceivably do their 30-city tour in one night and never leave home. What could possibly go wrong...

Sorry, not sorry. Creepfest...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UmXHkL3xiMU[/quote]

Posted: **25 Apr 2020 9:01 am**

Talking about belligerent customers...

A dear friend of mine was playing at The Bridge House in Canning Town (a particularly rough area in London's erstwhile Docklands) many, many years ago. They had a policy of allowing punters to get up and sing and, on this occasion, the wanna-be 'singer' was a 6'6" Merchant seaman who was 'the worse for wear'.

Sadly, another house 'policy' was controlling the mic level from behind the bar!!! They'd already seen trouble ahead so they muted the sound-system. The sailor turned around to my friend, tapping and blowing into the now-dead microphone, and said:

"Turn this f******* mic on or the banjo's gorn!!!"

As Ben had only recently acquired his beautiful 1959 Gibson ES-5 he implored the management to turn the sound on again - it was a close shave, though.

Posted: **25 Apr 2020 11:21 am**

Barry Blackwood wrote:
Why not go full Monty with this idea and have holographic images of the players projected onto a stage in real time? With the ability to create such a production in multiple venues simultaneously, a band could conceivably do their 30-city tour in one night and never leave home. What could possibly go wrong...
Sorry, not sorry. Creepfest...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UmXHkL3xiMU

LOL
You have to admit though, Barry - the rotoscoping technology is incredible. This could be one way a â€œnew normalâ€ might happen, in the Big Leagues, anyway. And it would definitely cut down on the wear & tear of prized equipment, especially in hazardous situations, like hurricanes, tornadoes, drunken parties, and such.

Posted: **28 Apr 2020 11:21 am**

What I like is the drunk guys who thinks hes going to play with your gear when the band is on break

Posted: **28 Apr 2020 1:31 pm**

Roger Rettig wrote:Talking about belligerent customers..

"Turn this f******* mic on or the banjo's gorn!!!

What was the meaning of this statement? What was meant by gorn? Is this dialect from a particular region of England?

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